Bedroom programming

[bhoggett]

Well, good luck with the project.

Let's face it: the vast majority of AmigaOS and MorphOS programs will be written by "bedroom programmers" for years to come.  The just isn't enough of a user base to support anything but the tiniest of commercial development bases.

That's not the problem. The problem is a lack of development tools. Compare what is available as a whole on the Amiga platforms to what comes for free on most Linux distros and you get a very sobering idea of how much improvement is needed.

[bhoggett]

@Dietmar

Just to clarify my previous statement about a lack of development tools:

I'm not referring to existing tools like GoldED, nor am I making a comment on its quality.

However, like you mentioned yourself, there are no decent interface builders, barely any support for anything except C/C++, no recent port of Python, no binding to native APIs (MUI & ReAction) for either Python or Perl, pathetic documentation all round for everything, no decent tutorials for anyone wanting to start up, etc., etc.

Rumour also has it that H&P have dropped all plans for Amiga products in the future. This could include the AOS4 version of StormC that was mooted. (My guess is that they could no longer secure the services of any Amiga developers, which is what happens when you stain your reputation beyond repair)

More and better development tools are needed if enough "bedroom programming" is going to be encouraged to help the Amiga platforms survive.

[bhoggett]

@Wishmaster

Enough tools available to do some serious programmation. Some "professional" developers are working with less.

Yes, yet they are not only experienced but also have a great deal of time to do so, not to mention a considerable base of re-usable code they've built up over the years. Often the development isn't even done on "Amigas", but on something like Linux and then cross-compiled.

That's not good enough for the "bedroom programmer" scene. New programmers have to be attracted (as well as new users) and the current range of tools don't make a really attractive proposition.

Once again I give any standard Linux distro as an example of what should be aimed at in terms of development tools.